Amazon Kindle

I feel like my schedule’s been getting away from me the past few weeks. I haven’t found as much writing time as I usually do. Why? We had the end of term 1 of school (all that grading and extra help and contacting home!) and the beginning of a new one, fun family things, yard work, some meetups with friends, some excursions with my husband… Good things, really. Even the yard work. My husband and I are still very much in the glow of having our first house and first yard. I’m loving being outside and taking care of the property. We filled a lot of leaf bags this weekend, and got to spend time outside together with the dog. Oh, and we washed the dog, and his bed. He will smell really good for a few days…or maybe one… Today, I’m writing right before I transition to doing a little more prep for this next (short!) week. I’m hoping that with this holiday week, I’ll find some extra time. I’m missing my quiet, intense hours.

It’s not that I haven’t written at all. There have been a few snatched, furtive moments, but not those long, satisfying stretches of repeated clicking and clacking of the keys until I truly can’t write any longer…sigh.

Ha ha–well, I have been reading, which has been good. I’m grateful to the “Text to Speech” feature of my Kindle that reads books to me for free while I’m getting ready in the mornings and on my commute. I couldn’t read nearly as much without it. My husband thinks the voice sounds awfully mechanical, and, hey, it’s not an actor, but I’ve gotten used to it. I don’t mind it. Thank you, authors and publishers who have enabled “Text to Speech.”

Here are my writing resolutions for the not-to-distant future:

-Polish my current short story, a deviation from my typical short stories, involving ghosts

-Return to writing my second novel (I’m midway through! I’m leaving the first one on the figurative shelf for now)

-Write another installment for this blog of “Shows I Liked that Got Cancelled”

-Write a post for this blog with my thoughts on some of my recent reads

I am a high school English teacher, and this takes up a lot of my time during the school year, so this summer I’m trying to spend as much of my time on writing as I can. As I’ve been reading, dreaming, writing, editing, and querying, I decided to self-publishing an ebook. This is the perfect time for me to delve into this process and learn the ins and outs through firsthand experience. I took a story which is dear to my heart, “Glass Eyes,” and prepared it for publication, focusing on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Smashwords.

Cover Art

I had a lot of fun creating the cover for my ebook. A stuffed fox features prominently in the story, and I knew that my aunt and uncle had one. I drove down to their place and took several photographs of it. My aunt and uncle were very helpful and accommodating!

Here are some covers that didn’t make the cut:

Once I got home, I sifted through my photos and edited the ones I liked best with the Microsoft Office Photo Editor. I brought my favorite edited images into Microsoft PowerPoint and added the title, subtitle, and my name. I played with placement, font, and color, and feel satisfied with the final product. I can’t wait to make another cover!

Here’s the one I went with:

I like the way the fox breaks up the image in this cover. If you look carefully on the right, there is a swing, representing my five-year-old protagonist, Kate. While I liked the images of the fox indoors in front of the books, I felt that those covers were too busy and distracting. I also felt the cover I went with felt more modern than some of the others.

The Kindle publications had some helpful information for how to navigate the process of publishing on Amazon. I found Coker’s book the most helpful. In addition to giving instructions for publishing an ebook, Coker also gives tips on marketing, defines terminology, and talks through the pros and cons of different ebook publishing decisions. Once I had gone through the steps to publish on Amazon, I also read the Smashwords Style Guide and carefully worked through the Smashwords template.

Formatting was a big part of this process. I spent a lot of time trying to get my indents to look right for the Kindle edition, and I read several pieces of internet advice and eventually found the right advice, written in a way that I could understand it, and (Hallelujah!) made a well-formatted book. I plan to add a blog post about formatting that goes into more detail, and I’ll share the resources I found helpful.

Published!

Once the ebook was available on Amazon and Smashwords, I was so excited! None of this excitement has dissipated yet. It’s exciting to have a published story out there, and I’m also looking forward to learning about marketing and sales through this experience. I’ll keep my ears open to advice. I meet with a weekly writer’s group of very kind and talented individuals, and I constantly benefit from their points of view. I’m also keeping in mind what I learned from attending this years NECRWA conference (New England Chapter Romance Writers of America). Many authors spoke about their experience with self-publishing and ebooks. In particular, I benefitted from author Katy Regnery‘s workshop in which she shared her experiences about indie and self-publishing, and all that goes along with them.

More details to follow! Have you self-published or indie published? What were some of your takeaways?

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